


The care in your heart

by samariumwriting



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Developing Relationship, Dimilix Remix, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Blue Lions Route, Fluff, M/M, Mental Health Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-10
Updated: 2020-05-10
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:55:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24110926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/samariumwriting/pseuds/samariumwriting
Summary: There are many ways to love another. For a long time, Felix showed that with his service, his sword. But when the war ended, something else emerged.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Felix Hugo Fraldarius
Comments: 20
Kudos: 63
Collections: Dimilix Remix 2020





	The care in your heart

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [call me by my name](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/618496) by yin_yoru. 



> This work is for the Dimilix Remix, where authors and artists 'remix' each other's works. Please check out the comic if you want a better insight as to what this fic "looks like" (and the rest of yin's work, she's very good!!). I hope I got the themes right!

_ Boar _

The battlefield raged around them, but Felix’s eyes were fixed on one thing only. Dimitri, the utter fool he was, had decided that the smartest thing to do was to charge ahead, away from their safe formation in range of their healers, and get himself surrounded by enemies.

Felix, fortunately, was doing his best to keep up. Because if Dimitri wasn’t going to look out for himself, Felix was going to make sure he didn’t fall. He could watch over him if nothing else. He had an extra eye to spare compared to Dimitri, anyway.

That said, his mind was shouting at him. He could barely keep his focus on the battles he had to fight himself because all he could think of was Dimitri. The night before. Everything he stood to lose.

_ They were the last ones up. Well, ‘last’ was a little relative, Felix supposed, because he’d already been to bed. Now he was up again, shaking off the shadows of a dream he absolutely did not want to think about. _

_ Dimitri was up too. Probably because he always slept poorly, these days. He’d managed before on little sleep, but Felix was still worried. They had a battle in the morning and Dimitri needed to be well rested. _

_ He made his way over to the fire, Dimitri’s figure shifting closer in the light. Felix went to tell him that he should be in bed, should be preparing for the battle to come, but instead...his words failed. Dimitri’s hand touched his knee, and it burned far hotter than the fire in front of them. _

_ He shook him off, not knowing exactly why. Dimitri looked at him, his eye filled with so many...he was disappointed. Upset, even, at Felix’s impulse reaction, and Felix saw a hundred things he didn’t want to see in Dimitri anymore. _

_ “Shut up,” he said. He didn’t know why he said it, exactly. In his dream, he’d seen Dimitri dead on the ground. This Dimitri was right in front of him, a slightly sad smile on his face, and Felix captured his lips with his own without even thinking. _

_ A moment of silence. Felix pulled away, his face on fire. “But I didn’t say anything,” Dimitri said, clearly confused. Felix loved him, and the whole encounter felt slightly like a dream. _

Felix was more afraid than anything that if he didn’t act, if he didn’t just move faster and kill more and pour everything he had into this, the dream he’d tried to escape in the small hours of the night would come true. He couldn’t stand for that.

He pushed through the enemy soldiers in front of him, cutting one to the left, one to the right, knowing he was breaking formation but realising he didn’t care. The only thing he could bring himself to care about was the thought of Dimitri, lying broken on the ground, axes pushed through his back, dead muscles spasming with thunder magic-

Thunder magic. Felix felt the spell more than saw it and dove forwards with his whole body. It was a stupid, risky move that Felix would never attempt if he was any less sure of the movements he was capable of, but he  _ was  _ sure and he  _ was  _ going to save Dimitri.

“Boar!” he roared, attempting to draw Dimitri’s attention as he cut through more enemies without even noticing the spell hurtling towards them both. Slightly desperately, Felix threw up his shield to try and catch the spell, knowing that with its size some of it could well strike him. He wasn’t thinking about it. He didn’t even know if he cared.

The spell hit the shield with a crackle, and Felix flinched as the thunder magic coursed through his body. But it was fine. He could take a hit or two. Well, with magic this strong he could maybe only take one, but he’d taken it. He’d protected Dimitri, who now whirled round, a half wild look in his eyes.

Dispatching the last of the soldiers that had surrounded him with barely a second glance, Dimitri made his way over to where Felix stood, stock still, trying to control the shaking in his limbs and exhaustion filling his body. “You took a hit,” Dimitri observed, as if Felix hadn’t run across half a battlefield to get him out of that specific mess.

“I did,” Felix replied, his teeth set. He tried not to sound too pleased that Dimitri was fine. “I’m fine. Let’s get back into the formation.”

Dimitri glanced back at the group he’d so clearly left behind, a look of faint surprise on his face. “Yes, that might be a good idea,” he said, moving to the other side of Felix’s body to cover the part the shield hadn’t quite managed to save. Felix had smelt something singed, but he hadn’t dared to check what it was.

Their progress was slower than Felix would have liked, but what really bothered him was what Dimitri did when they reached the main group. He pivoted slightly and, instead of leading then both to the head of the formation, the primary attacking group, he half pushed Felix over towards the back, where Mercedes waited to heal those who were injured.

When Mercedes smiled over at Dimitri, thanking him for helping Felix back to the group, he watched with simmering anger as Dimitri turned to go again. “Boar!” he called, and Dimitri paused. “You better not put yourself at risk again. I didn’t dive in front of that spell for you to get yourself killed when I can’t watch you.”

“Thank you for the concern and protection, Felix,” Dimitri replied, “but I was fine. Right now, the line of our formation is moving too slowly and I can go much further.” With that, he turned, and Mercedes had to hold Felix back to keep him from racing after him.

“Can’t he just make it a little bit easier?” he asked, struggling slightly in Mercedes’ grip. If he’d wanted to, he could have broken away, but he also knew that he needed healing. He wasn’t going to be able to protect Dimitri at all like this. “Why won’t he just accept my help, damn it!”

“You did a good job,” Mercedes said, and Felix wanted to snap back that he felt no obligation to protect Dimitri and it definitely wasn’t his job, not at all, but he kept silent. “Maybe he doesn’t want you protecting him with your life. Just your sword.”

“I wasn’t risking anything,” he snapped. “I wouldn’t risk a thing for the boar.” He was lying, truly and absolutely. Try as he might to push the fact away, he’d dived in front of the bolt of a spell without even thinking about it just to protect him.

But if Dimitri didn’t want him to do that...what was he going to do with himself? There was no option between not caring and caring enough to throw his full efforts into Dimitri’s cause. Of that, Felix was certain.

_ Dimitri _

When Felix woke up, he was slightly cold, with no figure in the bed next to him to keep him warm. The sun shone through the open window. That, at least, explained where the missing figure previously at his side had gone.

Had Felix been younger and angrier, he would have been frustrated that Dimitri had left the bed without waking him. When he did so, there was usually a reason, and he’d spent years getting angry at Dimitri deciding that whatever issue happened to be plaguing him was less important than Felix’s sleep.

But Felix wasn’t younger or angrier, he was thirty two, and he knew where Dimitri would be. The answer as to why he’d woken up alone wasn’t too far away.

Dimitri was, just as Felix had expected, out on the balcony that overlooked the main gardens in Fhirdiad’s castle. “Good morning, Dimitri,” he said, leaning up to press a kiss to Dimitri’s neck; warm. He hadn’t been out for long. “Are you okay?”

Dimitri looked back at him, a slightly bleary look in his eye. “No,” he admitted.

Felix reached his arms up to Dimitri’s shoulders and turned him away from his view, lowering them both until they sat, side by side, with their backs to the balcony wall. There, Felix took one of Dimitri’s hands in his and squeezed it gently. “What’s wrong?”

“I…” Dimitri didn’t say anything for a moment, letting the words hang between them until he felt ready to speak. “I was thinking about failure,” he admitted.

“Again, Dimitri?” Felix asked, keeping all the scorn or judgement out of his tone. That wouldn’t be fair on him.

“I feel as if everything is catching up to me,” he explained. “All the things I neglected in those years away, little bits of training that have fallen between the gaps in my memory. Because of it, I feel ill suited to be a ruler of any description. One day, I will fail my people, and where will that leave them?”

Once, Felix would have filled the short distance between them with insults. Chastisements to make Dimitri promise to be better, work harder, do more to cover up the problems that he thought would inevitably come to light.

Now, though...when Dimitri’s words faded into the morning air, Felix picked up where he left off, pushed back against the tide that threatened to overwhelm his husband. “There is no perfect ruler, Dimitri,” he said firmly. “You and I both know that there are many lacking rulers in this world, but the little bits of training you missed aren’t the important things. The important thing, the thing that makes you fit to rule Fódlan, is-”

Dimitri cut him off, smiling slightly as he filled in the end of the reasoning Felix was always happy to remind him of when his mind went astray. “Compassion,” he said. “The ability to care about others. Yes, Felix, you’re right.”

Felix leaned in a little closer, letting his thigh press up against Dimitri’s. He turned to face him, taking up Dimitri’s other hand. Their clasped hands fell between them, fingers interlocked. Felix’s finger brushed the smooth metal of Dimitri’s wedding ring, and he smiled. “How are you feeling now?” he asked.

Dimitri smiled, and it felt like a star had just been born in Felix’s heart. “Much better,” he replied. He leaned in very slightly, and Felix met him in the middle, their lips touching for one moment, then another, both twisted into easy smiles and warm sentiments that needed no voice. There was nothing else in the world in that moment.

When Felix pulled away, the chill of the wind snuck between them. He shivered, and then, a moment later, turned away from Dimitri to sneeze. Dimitri chuckled, reaching out to run his hands up and down Felix’s arms. Felix laughed with him, until the sound died away and Dimitri’s face turned serious again.

“How many of those scars were for me?” he asked, running one finger up the ragged scars on Felix’s left arm. Felix shivered again, and not from the cold. Dimitri’s hands returned to his own, and he lifted Felix’s left hand to press a small kiss against his wedding ring.

“As many as were needed to keep you here,” Felix said firmly. He was long past regretting anything about protecting Dimitri; he didn’t think he’d ever regretted it at all.

“Do you mind?” Dimitri asked, and Felix looked at him questioningly. “I remember you...there was a time when you got angry at me for not letting you protect me. Does it bother you that you can no longer do that?”

Felix thought of the rage that used to run through his veins with every breath. The fear that, if he ever stopped fighting, it would open up a rift inside him that nothing could ever fill. Now, he knew that the anger  _ was _ the rift, and he was more complete without it. “I’m fine with that, Dimitri,” he said, offering him another small smile.

Dimitri replied in kind and they lapsed into silence. There were many things that would have to be done that day, but Felix was content to savour this little moment, their hands interlocked and their backs against the cool stone, waiting for the sun to creep a little higher in the sky.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! If you have any thoughts please let me know in a comment, and you can also find me @samariumwriting on twitter :)


End file.
